Our regiment was what is called a march regiment, that is, one formed
while on the march. It had been made up at Mans, after much trouble,
of all the remains of a corps of dissimilar fighting units which
encumbered the city. Zuaves, mobilized soldiers, of franc-tireurs,
forestry guards, dismounted cavalrymen, including gendarmes, Spaniards
and Wallachians--there were troops of every kind and description, and
they were all under the command of an old captain quickly promoted for
the occasion to the rank of lieutenant colonel. At that time, such
promotions were not infrequent. The gaps of human flesh wrought in the
ranks of the French by the cannons of Wissembourg and Sedan had to be
filled. Several companies lacked officers.
At the head of mine was a little lieutenant of the reserves, a young
man of twenty, frail and pallid and so weak that after marching a few
kilometers he was out of breath, dragged his feet and usually reached
his destination in an ambulance wagon. The poor little devil! It was
enough to look at him to make him blush, and never did he allow himself
to issue orders for fear of appearing ridiculous. We jeered at him
because of his timidity and weakness, and no doubt because he was kind
and would sometimes distribute cigars and meat supplies to the men.
I quickly inured myself to this new life, carried away by examples
and overexcited by the fever about me. And reading the heartbreaking
reports of our lost battles, I felt myself transported by enthusiasm
which, however, was not mingled with any thought of my threatened
fatherland. We remained a month in Mans for training, to get our full
equipment and to frequent cabarets and houses of ill-fame. At last,
October 3, we started out.
Composed of stray units, of detachments without officers, of
straggling volunteers poorly equipped, poorly fed and more often not
fed at all,--without cohesion, without discipline, everyone thinking
of himself only, and driven by a unique feeling of ferociousness,
implacable selfishness; some wearing police caps, others having silk
handkerchiefs wrapped round their heads; still others wearing artillery
pants and vests of batmen--we were marching along the highways, ragged,
harassed and in an ugly mood.
For twelve days since we had been incorporated into a brigade of recent
formation, we were tramping across the fields like madmen and to no
purpose, as it were. Today marching to the right, tomorrow to the left,
one day covering a stretch of forty kilometers, the next day going back
an equal distance, we were moving in the same circle; like a scattered
herd of cattle which has lost its shepherd. Our enthusiasm diminished
appreciably. Three weeks of suffering were enough for that. Before we
could ever hear the roar of cannon and the whiz of bullets, our forward
march resembled a retreat of a conquered army, cut to pieces by cavalry
charges and precipitated into wild confusion. It was like a panicky
flight in which each one was allowed to shift for himself. How often
did I see soldiers getting rid of their cartridges by scattering them
along the roads?
"What good will they do me?" one of them said. "I don't need them at
all except one to crack the jaw of our captain, the first chance we get
to fight."
In the evening, in camp, squatted around the porridge pot or stretched
out on the cold furze, with heads resting on their knapsacks, they were
thinking of the homes from which they had been taken by force. All
the young men, strong and healthy, had come from the villages. Many
of them were already sleeping in the ground way yonder, disembowelled
by shells; others with shattered backs, like shadows, were straggling
in the fields and in the woods awaiting death. In the small country
places, left to sorrow, there were only old men, more stooped than
ever, and women who wept. The barn-floors where they thrashed corn were
mute and closed, in the deserted fields where weeds sprouted, one no
longer saw against the purple background of the sunset the silhouette
of the laborer returning home, keeping step with his tired horses.
And men with long sabres would come and in the name of the law take
away the horses one day and empty the cowshed the next; for it was not
enough that war should glut itself with human flesh, it was necessary
that it should also devour beasts, the earth itself, everything that
lived in the calm and peace of labor and love.... And at the bottom of
the hearts of all these miserable soldiers whose emaciated frames and
flagged limbs were lit up by the sinister glare of camp fires--there
was one hope, the hope of the coming battle, that is to say, the hope
of flight, of butt turned upwards, and of the German fortress.
Nevertheless we were preparing for the defence of the country which
we traversed and which was no longer threatened. To accomplish that
we thought it would be best to fell trees and scatter them on the
roads; we blew up bridges and desecrated cemeteries at the entrance to
villages under the pretext of barricading them, and we compelled the
inhabitants at the point of the bayonet to help us in the destruction
of their property. Then we would depart, leaving behind us nothing but
ruin and hatred. I remember one time we had to raze a very beautiful
park to the last staddling, in order to build barracks which we never
used at all. Our manner of doing things was not at all such as to
reassure the people. And so at our approach the houses were shut, the
peasants hid their provisions; everywhere we were met by hostile faces,
surly mouths and empty hands. There were bloody scuffles over some
potted pork discovered in a cupboard, and the general ordered an old
and kindly man shot for hiding a few kilograms of salted pork under a
heap of manure.
The first of November we marched all day and about three o'clock we
arrived at the railroad station of Loupe. There was great disorder and
unspeakable confusion at first. Many, leaving the ranks, scattered in
the direction of the city, ten kilometers away, and disappeared in the
neighboring cabarets. For more than an hour the bugles sounded a rally.
Mounted men were sent to the city to bring back the runaways, but they
themselves lingered there to get a drink. There was a rumor afloat that
a train made up at Nogent-le-Rotrou was supposed to take us to Chartres
menaced by the Prussians who were said to have sacked Maintenon and
were camping at Jouy. A workman questioned by our sergeant said that
he did not know anything about it, nor did he hear anything ever said
about it. The general, rather old, short, stout and gesticulating, who
could hardly sit up in his saddle, galloped hither and thither, shaking
and swaying like a drunkard on his saddle horse and with purple face,
bristled moustach, repeated without end:
"Ah! scoundrel!... Ah! scoundrel of scoundrels!..."
He dismounted, assisted by his orderly; his legs got tangled up in
the leather strap of his sabre which dragged on the ground, and
having called over the station master, entered into a most animated
conversation with the latter whose countenance showed perplexity.
"How about the mayor?" shouted the general. "Where is that scoundrel?
Get me that fellow!... Are they trying to make a fool out of me here or
what!"
He was out of breath, sputtered out unintelligible words, stamped his
feet and scolded the station master. Finally both of them, one with a
mien of humility, the other gesticulating furiously, disappeared into
the telegraph office from which there came to us the clicking of the
apparatus, frenzied, excited, interrupted from time to time by the
outbursts of the general. At last it was decided to draw us up on the
quay in company formation, and we were left there standing, knapsack on
the ground, in front of the formed arm racks.... Night came, rain fell,
drizzling and cold, penetrating through our uniforms already drenched
by showers. Here and there the road was lit up by small dim lights,
rendering more sombre than ever the storehouses and the mass of wagons
which men were pushing into a shed. And the derrick crane standing
upright on the turning platform projected its long neck against the sky
like a bewildered giraffe.
Apart from coffee which we gulped down hurriedly in the morning, we
did not eat anything all day, and although fatigue had worn out our
bodies and hunger clutched our stomachs, we anticipated with horror
that we would have to go without supper today. Our gourd-bottles were
empty, our supplies of biscuits and bacon exhausted, and the wagons
of the commissary department which had gone astray had not yet joined
our columns. Several among us grumbled, made threats and voiced their
rebellious feelings aloud, but the no less dejected officers who were
promenading in front of the arm racks, did not seem to take notice of
it. I consoled myself with the thought that the general had perhaps
requisitioned food in the city. It was a vain hope. The time passed,
the rain kept steadily drumming on the hollow mess plates and the
general continued swearing at the station master who in turn went on
avenging himself verbally on the telegraph, the click of which became
more and more violent and erratic. From time to time trains came up
over-crowded with troops. Soldiers of the reserve, light infantry
units, bare-breasted, bare-headed, with loose cravats, some of them
drunk and wearing their kepis wrong side up, deserted the wagons where
they were parked, invaded the taverns and even relieved themselves in
public impudently. From this swarm of human heads, from this stamping
on the floor of the cars by multitudes there emanated oaths, sounds
of the Marseillaise, obscene songs which mingled with shouts of the
gangs of workmen, with the tinkling of bells, with the panting of
machines.... I recognized a little boy from Saint-Michel whose swollen
eyelids oozed, who coughed and spat blood. I asked him where they were
going. He did not know. Having left Mans, they were held up at Connerre
for twelve hours without food because of congestion on the road,--too
crowded to lie down and sleep. He hardly had strength enough to speak.
He went into a tavern to rinse his eyes with warm water. I shook hands
with him, and he said he sincerely hoped that in the first battle the
Germans would make a prisoner of him.... And the train pulled out,
disappeared in the night, carrying all these wan faces, all these
bodies already vanquished----toward what useless and bloody slaughters?
I shivered with cold. Under the icy rain which drenched me to the very
marrow, I felt a terrible cold penetrating me. It seemed as if my
members were getting numb. I took advantage of the confusion caused by
the arrival of a train to reach the open gate and run out on the road
in search of a house or cover where I could warm myself, find a piece
of bread or something. The inns and public places near the station
were guarded by sentries who had orders not to let anyone in.... Three
hundred yards away I noticed a few windows which shone gently in the
night. These lights looked to me like two kindly eyes, two eyes filled
with pity which called me, smiled to me, caressed me.... It was a small
house isolated a few strides away from the road. I ran toward it.... A
sergeant accompanied by four men was there, shouting and swearing. Near
the fireplace without a fire, I saw an old man seated on a very low
wicker chair, his elbows resting on his knees, his face buried in his
hands. A candle burning in an iron candlestick lit up half of his face
hollowed and furrowed by deep wrinkles.
"Will you give us some wood, I am asking you for the last time?"
shouted the sergeant.
"I ain't got no wood," answered the old man.... "It's been eight days
since the troops passed here, I tell you.... They took everything away."
He huddled himself up on the chair and in a feeble voice muttered:
"I ain't got ... nothing... Nothing!..."
"Don't act the rogue, you old rascal.... Ah, you are hiding your wood
to warm the Prussians.... Well I am going to knock those Prussians out
of your head."
The old man shook his head:
"But if I ain't got no wood...."
With angry gestures the sergeant commanded the soldiers to search the
house. They examined everything, looked everywhere from cellar to
garret. They found nothing, nothing but evidence of plunder and some
broken furniture. In the cellar, damp with spilled cider, the casks
were broken open and over the whole there spread a hideously offensive
stench. That exasperated the sergeant who struck the flat end of the
butt of his musket.
"Come on," he shouted, "come on, you old sloven, tell us where your
wood is," and he rudely shook the old man who tottered and almost
struck his head against the andiron of the fireplace.
"I ain't got no wood," the poor man simply repeated.
"Ah! you are getting stubborn!... You have no wood you say! Well, look
here, you have chairs, a buffet, a table, a bed ... if you don't tell
me where your wood is I'll burn it all up."
The old man did not protest. Shaking his aged white head he again
repeated:
"I ain't got no wood."
I wanted to intercede and muttered a few words; but the sergeant did
not let me finish. He took me in from head to foot with a look of
contempt.
"What are you doing around here, you errand simp you? Who gave you
permission to leave the ranks, you dirty, snotty-nosed trash? Come on,
face about double step, march!... Ta ra ta ta ra, ta ta ra!..."
Then he gave the command. In a few minutes the chairs, the tables, the
buffet, the bed were dashed to pieces. The kindly man raised himself
with some effort, went into the farthest corner of the room; and while
the fire was being made, while the sergeant, whose cloak and trousers
were steaming, was warming himself laughingly in front of the crackling
fire, the old man was watching the burning of his last piece of
furniture with eyes of a stoic, and never stopped repeating obstinately:
"I ain't got no wood."
I went back to the station. The general had come out of the telegraph
office more excited and flushed and angry than ever. He jabbered out
something and presently brought about a great commotion. The clang of
sabres was heard, voices called out and answered one another, officers
were running in all directions. The bugle sounded. Without the least
understanding of this counter order, we had to put our knapsacks on our
backs and the guns on our shoulders.
Forward! March!...
With bodies rendered rigid by immobility and with dizzy heads, we
pushed and jostled one another and resumed our breathless journey in
the rain, in the mud, through the night!... To the right and the left
of us there were long stretches of fields swallowed up in the shadows
from which rose the crowns of apple trees which appeared to be twisted
in the skies. From time to time the barking of a dog was heard from
afar.... There were deep forests, sombre thickets which rose like walls
on each side of the road. Then came villages asleep, where our steps
resounded even more mournfully, or where at a window quickly opened and
quickly closed again, there appeared the vague outline of a human white
form ... terrified.... Then again fields and woods and villages.... Not
a single song, not a single word, only an immense silence, accentuated
by the rhythm of the tramping feet. The leather straps of the knapsack
cut into my flesh, the rifle felt like a red hot iron bar placed
upon my shoulder. For a moment I thought myself harnessed to a huge
wagon, loaded with broad stone and stuck in the mud and felt that the
carters were breaking my legs with the lashes of whips. With my feet
planted in the ground, my spine bent in two, with outstretched neck,
strangled by the bit, my lungs emitting a rattling sound, I was pulling
and pulling.... Pretty soon I reached a state where I was no longer
conscious of anything. I was marching in a state of torpor, like an
automaton, as if in a trance.... Strange hallucinations flitted before
my eyes. I saw a glowing road receding into space, lined with palatial
mansions and brilliant lights.... Strange scarlet flowers swayed their
corollæ in the air on the top of flexible stems, and a crowd of gay
people were singing at tables laden with refreshments and delicious
fruit.... Women with fluttering gauze skirts were dancing on illumined
lawns, to the music of numerous orchestras hidden in the grove strewn
with falling leaves, adorned with jasmines, sprinkled with water.
"Halt!" commanded the sergeant.
I stopped, and in order not to sink down to the ground I had to hold
on to the arm of a comrade. I awoke from my trance.... Darkness was
all around me. We had come to the entrance of a forest, near a small
town where the general and most of the officers went to find quarters.
Having pitched my tent, I occupied myself with rubbing my feet, the
skin of which was peeling off, with a candle which I had hidden in my
knapsack, and like an emaciated dog, stretched myself out on the wet
ground and immediately fell asleep. During the night, fellow-soldiers
who, exhausted with fatigue, had dropped out of the ranks on the road,
kept on coming into camp. Of these, five men were never heard from. It
was ever so at each difficult march. Some of the men, weak or sick,
fell into the ditches and died there; others deserted....
The next morning reveille was sounded at dawn. The night had been
extremely cold, it never stopped raining and we could not get any straw
litter or hay to sleep on. It was very difficult for me to get out of
the tent; for a while I was obliged to crawl on my knees on all fours,
my legs refusing to carry me. My limbs were frozen stiff like bars
of iron, I could not move my head on my paralyzed neck, and my eyes
which felt as if they had been pricked by numerous tiny needles, kept
shedding tears in ceaseless streams.... At the same time I felt an
acute, lancinating, unbearable pain in my back and shoulders. I noticed
that my comrades fared no better. With drawn faces of ghostly pallor
they were advancing, some limping piteously, others bent down and
staggering over clumps of underbrush--all lame, mournful and covered
with mud. I saw several men who, seized with the colic, writhed and
twisted their mouths, holding their hands to their bellies. Some of
them were shivering with fever, and their teeth chattered with cold.
All around us one could hear dry coughs rending human breasts, groans,
short and raucous breathing. A hare ventured out of its cover and fled
wildly, with its ears flapping, but no one thought of pursuing the
animal as we used sometimes to do. After the roll call, foodstuffs were
distributed, as the commissary regained our regiment. We made some soup
which we ate as greedily as half-starved dogs.
I was still suffering. After the soup I had an attack of dizziness
followed by vomiting, and I shook with fever. Everything around me
was in a whirl--the tents, the forest, the fields, the small town way
yonder, whose chimneys were smoking in the mist, and the sky where
huge clouds were floating, bleak and low. I asked the sergeant for
permission to see a doctor.
Our tents were arranged in two rows, backed against the forest on each
side of the road of Senonches which led into the open country through a
magnificent grove of oak trees, crossed the Chartre road three hundred
meters away and still further the town of Belhomert and extended
farther toward Loupe. At the crossing of these two roads there was a
small dilapidated building covered with thatch, a sort of abandoned
shed which provided shelter for the laborers on the road during rain.
It was here that the surgeon had established a sort of improvised field
hospital recognizable by a Red Cross flag put up in a crack in the wall
and adorning it.
In front of the house a crowd was waiting. A long line of human beings,
wan and worn out, some standing with fixed looks, others sitting
on the ground, sad with stooped and pointed shoulders, their heads
buried in their hands. Death had already laid its terrible hand upon
these emaciated countenances, these scraggy frames, these members
which hung loose, devoid of blood and marrow. And confronted with
this heartbreaking sight, I forgot my own suffering, and my heart was
touched with pity. Three months were sufficient to break down these
robust bodies, inured to labor and fatigue!... Three months! And these
young men who loved life, these children of the soil who grew up as
dreamers in the freedom of the fields, trusting in the goodness of
nature, these youths were done for!... To the marine who dies is given
the sea as a burying place; he descends into eternal darkness to the
rhythm of its murmuring waves. But these!... A few more days of grace
perhaps, and then these tatterdemallions will suddenly tumble down
into the mud of a ditch, their corpses delivered, up to the fangs of
prowling dogs and to the beaks of nightbirds.
I was swept by a feeling of such brotherly and sorrowful pity for them
that I wished I could press all these unhappy men to my breast, in a
single embrace, and I wished, oh, how ardently I wished it!--I had a
hundred female breasts, like Isis, swollen with milk, that I might
offer to all these bloodless lips.... They were entering the house one
by one and were leaving it as quickly, pursued by growling and swearing
sounds. For the rest, the surgeon did not bother with them at all.
Very angry, he was demanding of his orderly his medicine chest which
was missing from the luggage.
"My medicine chest, for God's sake!" he shouted. "Where is my medicine
chest? And my instrument case?... What did you do with my instrument
case? Ah! for God's sake!..."
A little soldier of the reserves who suffered from an abscess on
his knee came back hopping on one foot, crying, pulling his hair in
despair. They did not want to attend to him. When it was my turn to go
in I was all atremble. Inside the place which was dark, four patients,
lying flat in the straw, were emitting rattling sounds like the cock
of a musket; a fifth one was gesticulating, muttering incoherent words
in delirium; still another, half-reclining, with head drooped on his
chest, was moaning and asking for a drink in a feeble voice, the voice
of an infant. Squatted in front of the fire place, an attendant was
holding over the flame, on the end of a stick, a piece of stale pudding
whose stench of burned grease filled the room. The adjutant did not
even look at me. He shouted:
"Well, what's the matter now?... A bunch of lazy buggers. A good
ten league run at a stretch will fix you up, you straggler.... Face
about!... March!"
On the threshold I met a peasant woman who asked me:
"Is this the place where you can see the doctor."
"Women now!" growled the adjutant. "What do you want now?"
"Beg pardon, excuse me, Doctor," rejoined the peasant woman, who came
up very timidly. "I came for my son who is a soldier."
"Tell me now, old woman, am I here to keep track of your son, or what?"
With her hands crossed on the handle of her umbrella, timorous, she
examined the place about her.
"It seems like he is very sick, my son is, very, very sick.... And so I
came to see if he was not around here, Doctor."
"What's your name?"
"My name is Riboulleau."
"Riboulleau.... Riboulleau!... That may be ... look in that pile there."
The attendant who was broiling his pudding turned his head.
"Riboulleau," he said, "why he has been dead three days already...."
"What is that you are saying?" cried the peasant woman whose sunburned
face suddenly became pallid. "Where did he die?... Why did he die, my
little darling boy."
The adjutant intervened, and rudely pushing the old woman toward the
door, shouted:
"Go on, go on, no scenes around here! Well, he is dead--and that is all
there is to it."
"My little darling boy! My little darling boy!" wailed the old woman in
a heart-breaking manner.
I walked away with a heavy heart and felt so discouraged that I was
asking myself whether it was not better to put an end to it all at once
by hanging myself on the branch of a tree or by blowing my brains out
with the gun. While I was going to my tent, stumbling on the way, I was
hardly paying any attention to the little soldier who, having stopped
at the foot of a pine tree, had opened his abscess with his knife
himself, and, pale, with sweat drops rolling all over his forehead, was
bandaging his bleeding wound.
In the morning I felt a great deal better than I thought I would. I was
relieved of all work, and after having greased my rifle which became
rusted in the rain, I enjoyed a few hours of rest. Stretched out on
my blanket, with my body torpid in delicious half slumber where I
distinctly heard all the noises of the camp--the sounding of the bugle,
the neighing of the horses as if coming from afar--I was thinking of
the people and the things I had left behind me. A thousand images and a
thousand scenes of the past rapidly filed before my eyes. I saw again
the Priory, my dead mother and my father, with his large straw hat and
the short beggar with his flaxen hair and Felix squatted in the lettuce
patches, lying in wait for a mole. I saw again my study room, my school
mates and, topping the noise of the Bal Bullier, Nini, her hair loose
and brown, with her ruddy neck and her pink stockings showing like
some lascivious flower from under the skirt raised in dancing. Then
the image of an unknown woman in a yellow dress, whom I noticed in the
shadow of a box in a theatre one evening, came back to me--an insistent
and sweet vision.
During this time the strongest among us had gone out to roam in the
fields and on the farms. They came back merrily carrying bundles of
straw, chickens, turkeys and ducks. One of them was driving before him
with a switch, a big, grunting pig; another was balancing a sheep on
his shoulder. At the end of a halter the latter was also dragging a
calf which, tangled up in the rope, resisted comically and shook its
snout, bellowing all the time. The peasants came up running to the camp
to complain that they had been robbed; they were hooted and driven out.
The general, very stiff and with round eyes, came to review us in the
afternoon, accompanied by our lieutenant who walked at his right.
His shiny look, his flushed cheeks, his mealy voice bore witness to
the fact that he had had a plentiful breakfast. He was munching the
end of an extinguished cigar; he spat, sniffed, swore. One could not
tell at whom or what, for he did not address himself to any one in
particular. When standing in front of our company, he looked at our
lieutenant-colonel severely, and I heard him say:
"Your men are dirty slops!"
Then he walked away, his body weighed down by his belly, dragging his
feet, dressed in yellow boots above which red breeches swelled and
folded like a skirt.
The rest of the day was devoted to loitering in the taverns of
Belhomert. There was such crowding and such noise everywhere, and
besides I knew so well these fights in the cabarets, these violent
outbursts as a result of drunkenness which often degenerated into
general scuffles, that I preferred to go out on the road, far from all
these brawls, in the company of a few peaceable comrades.
Just then the weather grew better, dim sunlight came from the sky
freed from clouds. We seated ourselves on the side of a sloping hill,
bending our backs under the warm sun rays as does a cat under the hand
that caresses it. Vehicles kept passing by, heavy carts, dung carts,
small carriages with awning hoods, rubbish carts drawn by small mules.
Those were the peasants of Chartres valley who were fleeing from the
Prussians.... Excited by rumors, spread from village to village, of
burnings, robberies, murders and all kinds of atrocities committed by
the Germans in the invaded territories, they were carrying away in
haste their most precious possessions, abandoning their homes and their
fields and, utterly bewildered, were proceeding straight ahead, without
knowing where they were going. In the evening they would stop at some
chance road, near a town, sometimes in the open fields. The horses,
unharnessed and fettered, browsed on the river banks, the people ate
and slept at God's mercy, guarded by dogs, in storm and rain, in
the cold of foggy nights. Then in the morning they would start out
again. Droves of animals, and throngs of men succeeded one another
alternately. They were passing by us, and upon the yellow main road
one could see the black and mournful procession of the refugees as far
as the hill closing the horizon: one might think it was an exodus of a
whole people. I questioned an old man who led a donkey pulling a cart,
at the bottom of which in the midst of bundles, tied with kerchiefs,
and carrots and heads of cabbage, on a pile of straw there shifted
about a peasant woman with a flat nose, two pink-colored pigs and a few
domestic fouls tied by their feet in twos.
"Eh, the robbers!" the old man replied. "Don't speak to me about
them!... They came one morning, a whole gang of them with plumed
hats.... They raised such a racket!... Eh, Holy Jesus! And then they
took everything away.... Well I thought they were the Prussians.... I
have found out since that they were the 'franc-tireurs'...."
"How about the Prussians?"
"The Prussians!... Of them that are Prussians I have seen very few
to be sure.... They are supposed to be up at our place right now!...
Jacqueline thinks she saw one behind the hedge the other day!... He was
tall, very tall and he was as red as the devil.... Is he really one of
these fellows, those savages that came?... Now tell me truly who are
they?"
"Those are Germans, old man, just as we are French."
"Germans?... So I hear.... But what do they want, those damned Germans,
will you please tell me, mister soldier?... Well, I have saved two
pigs, our girl and all our poultry just the same!... By Jove!"
And the peasant continued on his way, repeating:
"The Germans! the Germans!... What do these damned Germans want?"
That evening fires were made along the entire line of the camp, and
the attractive looking pots full of fresh meat were hissing joyously
upon the improvised stoves of earth and stone. For us that was a time
of exquisite respite and delicious forgetfulness. Peace seemed to have
descended from heaven, all blue with the moon and aglitter with stars;
the fields, unrolling themselves with soft and misty undulations, had
in them a kind of tender sweetness which penetrated into our souls
and set new blood, less acrid and endowed with new vigor, circulating
in our members. Little by little, memories of our hardships, our
discouragements and privations, however near, effaced themselves, and
simultaneously with the awakening of our sense of duty, a desire for
action seized us. Unusual animation reigned at our camp. Every one
offered voluntarily to do some kind of work; some, torch in hand, were
running about to light again the fires which went out, others were
blowing at the ashes in order to kindle them into flame again, still
others were sorting vegetables and slicing meat. Some comrades, forming
a circle around the debris of burned timber, struck up a tune "Have you
seen Bismark?" in a jeering chorus. Revolt--the child of hunger--had
its inception in the hissing of saucepans, in the clatter of platters.
The next day, when the last of us answered "Present" at the roll call,
the little lieutenant gave the command: "Form a circle, march!"
And in a faltering voice, jumbling the words and skipping phrases, the
quartermaster read a pompous order of the day, issued by the general.
In that piece of military literature it was said that a Prussian army
corps, starving, ill-clad and without arms, after having occupied
Chartres, was advancing on us at double marching time. Our task was to
block its way, to throw it back as far as the walls of Paris, where
the valiant Ducrot was only waiting for our arrival to sally out and
clean the land of all invaders at one sweep. The general recalled
the victories of the Revolution, the Egypt expedition, Austerlitz,
Borodino. He expressed the faith that we would show ourselves worthy
of our glorious ancestors of Sambre-et-Meuse. In view of that he gave
precise strategic instructions for the defense of the country, namely:
to establish an impregnable barrier to the eastern entrance to the town
and another still more impregnable barrier upon the road of Chartres,
to fortify the walls of the cemetery at the crossroad, to fell as many
trees as possible in the nearby forest so that the enemy cavalry and
even infantry should be unable to turn our flank from Senonches under
the cover of the woods, to be on the lookout for spies, and finally to
keep our eyes open.... The country was counting on us.... Long live the
Republic!
The cheer was not responded to. The little lieutenant who was walking
around, his arms crossed on his back, his eyes obstinately fixed on the
point of his boot, did not raise his head. We looked at one another
perplexed, with a sort of anguish in our hearts, which came as a result
of our knowledge that the Prussians were very near, that war was going
to begin for us in earnest the very next day, today perhaps. And I
had a sudden vision of Death, red Death standing on a chariot, drawn
by rearing horses, which was sweeping down on us, brandishing his
scythe. As long as the actual fighting was only a remote possibility
we wanted to be in it, first for reasons of patriotism, enthusiasm,
then out of mere braggadocio, later because we were nervously exhausted
and wearisome and saw in it a way out of our misery. Now when the
opportunity offered itself, we were afraid; we shuddered at the mere
mention of it. Instinctively my eyes turned toward the horizon, in the
direction of Chartres. And the fields seemed to me to conceal a secret,
unknown terror, a fearful uncertainty, which lent to things a new
aspect of relentlessness. Over yonder, above the blue line of trees,
I expected to see helmets spring up suddenly, bayonets flash, the
thundering mouths of cannons spurt fire. A harvest field, all red under
the sun, appeared to me like a pond of blood. Hedges strung themselves
out into armies, joined ranks, crossed one another like regiments,
bristling with arms and standards and going through various evolutions
before the battle. The apple trees looked frightened like cavalry men
thrown into disorder.
"Break the circle--march!" shouted the lieutenant.
Stupefied, with swinging arms, we were standing on one place for a
long time, a prey to some vague misgiving, trying to pierce in thought
this terrible line on the horizon, behind which was now being realized
the mystery of our fate. In this disquieting silence, in this sinister
immobility, only carts and herds were passing by, more numerous, more
hurried and pressed than ever. A flock of ravens, which came from
yonder like a black vanguard, spotted the skies, thickened, distended
and, stringing itself out into a line, turned aside, floating above us
like a funeral cloak, then disappeared among the oak trees.
"At last we are going to see them, these famous Prussians!" said, in a
faltering voice, a big fellow who was very pale and who, in order to
give himself the air of a fearless daredevil, was beating his ears with
his kepi.
No one replied to this remark and several walked away. Our corporal,
however, shrugged his shoulders. He was a very impudent little man,
with a pock-eaten face, full of pimples.
"Oh! I!" he said.
He clarified his thought by a cynical gesture, sat down on the heath,
puffed at his pipe slowly, till fire appeared.
"Oh, piffle!" he concluded, emitting a cloud of smoke which vanished in
the air.
While one company of chasseurs was detailed to the crossroads to
establish an "impregnable barrier" there, my company went in the woods
to "fell as many trees as possible." All the axes, bill-hooks and
hatchets of the village were speedily requisitioned. Almost everything
was used as a tool. For a whole day the blows of the axes were
resounding and trees were falling. To spur us on to greater efforts,
the general himself wanted to assist us in the vandalism.
"Come on, you scamps!" he would cry out at every occasion, clapping his
hands. "Come on boys, let's get this one!..."
He himself pointed out the most stalwart among the trees, those which
grew up straight and spread out like the columns of a temple. It was an
orgy of destruction, criminal and foolish; a shout of brutal joy went
up every time a tree fell on top of another with a great noise. The old
trees became less dense, one could say they were mowed down by some
gigantic and supernatural scythe. Two men were killed by the fall of an
oak tree.
And the few trees which remained standing, austere in the midst of
ruined trunks lying on the ground, and the twisted branches which rose
up towards them like arms outstretched in supplication, were showing
open wounds, deep and red gashes from which the sap was oozing, weeping
as it were.
The supervisor of the forest section, warned by a guard, came running
from Senonches, and with a broken heart witnessed this useless
devastation. I was near the general when the forester approached him
respectfully, kepi in hand.
"Beg pardon, general," said he. "I can understand the felling of trees
on the edge of the road, the barricading of lines of approach....
But your destruction of the heart of the old forest seems to me a
little...."
But the general interrupted:
"Eh? What? It seems to you what?...What are you butting in here for?...
I do as I please.... Who is commander here, you or I?..."
"But...." stammered the forester.
"There are no buts about it, Monsieur.... You make me tired, that's one
thing sure!... You had better hurry back to Senonches or I'll have you
strung up on a tree.... Come on, boys!..."
The general turned his back on the stupefied agent and walked away
knocking some dead leaves and sprigs before him with the end of his
cane.
While we were thus desecrating the forest, the chasseurs were not idle
either, and the barricade rose, huge and formidable, cutting off the
road at the crossroad. It was accomplished not without difficulty and
above all not without gayety. Suddenly halted by a trench which barred
their flight, the peasants protested. Their carts and herds became
congested on the road, very narrow at this point; there was, therefore,
an indescribable uproar. They were complaining, the women were moaning,
the cattle were lowing, the soldiers were laughing at the frightened
looks of men and beasts, and the captain who was in command of the
troops did not know what action to take. Several times the soldiers
pretended to drive the peasants back at the point of the bayonet, but
the latter were stubborn and determined to pass and invoked their
rights as Frenchmen. Having made his round in the forest, the general
went to see the progress of the work on the barricade. He demanded to
know what "these dirty civilians" wanted. He was told about it.
"All right," he cried. "Seize all their carts and throw them into the
barricade.... Come on, get a move on you, boys!..."
The soldiers, rejoicing in the opportunity, hurled themselves on the
first carts which stood abandoned with everything in them, and smashed
them with a few blows of the pick-axe. A wild panic broke out among
the peasants. The congestion became so great that it was impossible
for them either to advance or to turn back. Lashing their horses with
all their might and trying to extricate their impeded wagons, they
were shouting, jostling and bruising one another without making a step
backward. Those last arrived had turned back and were going at full
speed of their horses excited by the tumult; others, despairing of a
chance to save their carts and provisions, climbed over the barrier
and, dispersing across the field, uttered cries of indignation, pursued
by oaths and curses flung at them by the soldiers. Then, they piled
up the smashed vehicles one on top of the other, filled the gaps with
sacks of oats, matresses, bundles of clothes and stones. On top of
the barricade, upon a coach pole, which rose vertically upward like a
flagstaff, a little chasseur planted a bouquet of wedding flowers found
among other booty.
Towards the evening, groups of reserves arriving from Chartres in great
disorder, scattered all over Belhomert and the camp. They brought
horrible tales. The Prussians were more than a hundred thousand strong,
all in one army. They, the reserves, hardly had time to fall back....
Chartres was in flames, the villages in the vicinity were burning, the
farms were destroyed. The greater part of the French detachments which
bore the brunt of covering the retreat, could not hold out much longer.
The fugitives were questioned; they were asked whether they saw the
Prussians, what insignia they wore and were particularly quizzed about
all the details of the enemy uniforms.
Every fifteen minutes new reserves would show up in groups of two or
three, pale, exhausted with fatigue. Most of them had no kits, some had
no guns, and they were telling stories, each more terrible than the
other. None of them was wounded. It was decided to quarter them in the
church, to the great indignation of the curé who, lifting his arms to
heaven, exclaimed:
"Holy Virgin!... In my church!... Ah! Ah! Soldiers in my church!..."
Up to this time the general who was preoccupied solely with his
plans of destruction, had no time to provide for the guarding of the
camp, except by establishing a small outpost in a tavern, frequented
by carterers within a mile from Belhomert upon the Chartres road.
This outpost, commanded by a sergeant, had not received any definite
instructions, and the man did nothing except loaf, drink and sleep.
Still the sentinel who was nonchalantly pacing to and fro in front of
the tavern, gun on shoulder, at one time arrested a country doctor as a
German spy because of his blond beard and blue spectacles. As for the
sergeant, an old professional poacher who sneered at everything and
everybody, he amused himself by setting traps for rabbits in the hedges
nearby.
The arrival of the reserves, the menace of the Prussians had thrown
us into confusion. Messengers came up every minute, carrying sealed
envelopes containing orders and counter-orders. The officers were
running about with a preoccupied look, not knowing what to do, and
completely lost their heads. Three times we were ordered to break up
camp and three times we were told to pitch our tents anew. All night
trumpets and bugles were sounding, and big log fires were burning,
around which, in the growing tumult, were passing back and forth
shadows strangely agitated, silhouettes of demoniacal appearances.
Patrols were scouring the fields, riding out on the crossroads,
searching the outskirts of the forest. Artillery stationed on this side
of the town was ordered to move up forward upon the heights, but it
ran into the barricade. To clear the way for the cannons, it was found
necessary to demolish it piece-meal and to fill up the ditch.
At daybreak my company was sent to do main guard duty. We met mobilized
soldiers, dispirited franc-tireurs who were dragging their feet
piteously. A little further away, the general, accompanied by his
staff, was watching the manoeuvres of the artillery. He held a map of
the general staff, unfolded on the neck of his horse, and was vainly
trying to locate the Saussaie mill. Bending over the map which the
horse shifted out of place with every movement of its head, he shouted:
"Where is that damned mill?... Pontgouin.... Couville.... Courville....
Do they think I know all their damned mills around here?"
The general commanded us to halt and asked:
"Is there anyone here who is familiar with this country?... Is there
anyone here who knows where the Saussaie mill is?"
Nobody answered.
"No?... Well alright. To hell with it!"
And he threw the map to his aide who began folding it up carefully. We
resumed our march.
The company was stationed on a farm and I was put on guard duty near
the road, at the entrance to a grove, beyond which I could look on
an open plain, immense and smooth like the sea. Here and there small
woods emerged from the ocean of land like islands; the belfries of
the villages, the farms, blurred by the fog, assumed the aspect of
a distant veil. In this enormous expanse a great silence reigned, a
solitude wherein the least noise, the least thing stirring in the
skies, had something mysterious about it which put anguish into one's
heart. Up above, black dots spotted the skies--those were the ravens;
down below, upon the earth, small black specks moved forward, growing
larger, disappearing--those were the fleeing soldiers of the reserves;
and now and then the distant barking of dogs, answered by similar
barking all along the line from east to west, from north to south,
sounded like the plaint of the deserted fields. Our guard was supposed
to be relieved every four hours, but hours upon hours passed, slow and
endless, and no one came to take my place.
No doubt they had forgotten all about me. With a heavy heart I was
searching the horizon on the Prussian side, the French side; I saw
nothing, nothing but this hard, relentless line, which encircled the
huge grey sky around me. It was a long time since the ravens had ceased
flying and the reserve soldiers fleeing. For a moment I saw a truck
coming toward the woods where I was, but it turned off on one of the
roads and soon was no longer distinguishable from the grey terrain....
Why did they leave me thus?... I was hungry and I was cold, my bowels
rumbled, my fingers became numb. I ventured out on the road a little;
having walked a few steps I shouted.... Not a being answered my call,
not a thing stirred.... I was alone, utterly alone, alone in this
deserted, empty field.... A shudder passed through my frame, and tears
came into my eyes.... I shouted again.... No answer.... Then I went
back into the woods and sat down at the foot of an oak tree, with my
rifle across my lap, keeping a sharp lookout and waiting.... Alas! The
day was waning little by little, the sky grew yellow, then purple by
degrees and finally vanished in deadly silence. And night, moonless and
starless, fell upon the fields, and at the same time a chilling fog
arose from the shadows.
Worn out with fatigue, always occupied with something or other and
never alone, I had no time to reflect on anything from the moment we
started out. But still confronted by the strange and cruel sights
constantly before my eyes, I felt within me the awakening of the idea
of human life which until now had lain slumbering in the sluggishness
of my childhood and the torpor of my youth. Yes ... the idea awoke
confusedly, as if emerging from a long and painful nightmare. And
reality appeared to me more frightful than the nightmare. Transposing
the instincts, the desires and passions which agitated us from the
small group of errant men that we were to society as a whole, recalling
the impressions so fleeting and wholly external which I had received
in Paris, the rude crowds, the pushing and jostling of pedestrians,
I understood that the law of the world was strife; an inexorable,
murderous law, which was not content with arming nation against nation
but which hurled against one another the children of the same race, the
same family, the same womb. I found none of the lofty abstractions of
honor, justice, charity, patriotism of which our standard books are so
full, on which we are brought up, with which we are lulled to sleep,
through which they hypnotize us in order the better to deceive the
kind little folk, to enslave them the more easily, to butcher them the
more foully.
What was this country, in whose name so many crimes were being
committed, which had torn us--formerly so full of love--from the
motherly bosom of nature, which had thrown us, now so full of hatred,
famished and naked, upon this cruel land?... What was this country,
personified to us by this rabid and pillaging general who gave vent to
his madness on old people and trees, and by this surgeon who kicked the
sick with his feet and maltreated poor old mothers bereaved of their
sons?... What was this country every step on whose soil was marked by a
grave, which had but to look at the tranquil waters of its streams to
change them into blood, which was always frittering away its man power,
digging here and there deep charnel vaults where the best children
of men were rotting?... And I was astounded, when for the first time
it dawned upon me that only those were the most glorious, the most
acclaimed heroes of mankind who had pillaged the most, killed the most,
burned the most.
They condemn to death the stealthy murderer who kills the passerby
with a knife, on the corner of the street at night, and they throw his
beheaded body into a grave of infamy. But the conqueror who has burned
cities and decimated human beings, all the folly and human cowardice
unite in raising to the throne of the most marvelous; in his honor
triumphal arches are built, giddy columns of bronze are erected, and in
the cathedrals multitudes reverently kneel before his tomb of hallowed
marble guarded by saints and angels under the delighted gaze of God!...
With what remorse did I repent of the fact that until now I had
remained blind and deaf to this life so full of inexplicable riddles!
Never had I opposed this mysterious book, never had I stopped even for
a single moment to consider the question marks which are represented by
things and beings; I did not know anything. And now, suddenly, a desire
to know, a yearning to wrest from life some of its enigmas tormented
me; I wanted to know the human reason for creeds which stupefy, for
governments which oppress, for society which kills; I longed to be
through with this war so that I might consecrate myself to some ardent
cause, to some magnificent and absurd apostleship.
My thought traveled toward impossible philosophies of love, toward
utopias of undying brotherhood.... I saw all men bent down beneath
some crushing heels; they all resembled the little soldier of the
reserves at Saint-Michel, whose eyes were running, who was coughing and
spitting blood, and as I knew nothing of the necessity of higher laws
of nature, a feeling of compassion rose within me, clogging my throat
with suppressed sobs. I have noticed that a man has no real compassion
for anyone except when he himself is unhappy. Was this not, after all,
but a form of self-pity? And if on this cold night, close to the enemy
who would perhaps come out of the fogs of the morrow, I loved humanity
so much--was it not myself only that I loved, myself only that I wanted
to save from suffering? These regrets of the past, these plans for the
future, this sudden passion for study, this ardor which I employed in
picturing myself in the future in my room on the Rue Oudinot, in the
midst of books and papers, my eyes burning with the fever of work--was
this not after all only a means to ward off the perils of the present,
to dispel other horrible visions, visions of death which, blurred and
blunted, incessantly followed one another in the terror of darkness?
Night, impenetrable night continued. Under the sky which brooded over
them, sinister and greedy, the fields stretched like a vast sea of
Shadow. At long intervals, out of the dead whiteness, long curtains
of fog were floating up above, grazing the invisible ground where
clumps of trees here and there appeared still darker in the surrounding
darkness. I never stirred from the place where I sat down, and the cold
numbed my members and chapped my lips. With difficulty I raised myself
and walked on the outskirt of the woods. The sound of my own steps
on the ground frightened me, it always seemed to me that someone was
walking behind me. I was walking carefully, on tiptoe, as if afraid
to wake the sleeping earth, and listened, trying to penetrate the
darkness, for in spite of everything, I had not yet given up the hope
that some one would come to relieve me. Not a stir, not a breath, not
a glimmer of light in this blind and mute night. Twice, however, I
distinctly heard the sound of steps, and my heart thumped violently....
But the noise moved away, grew fainter by degrees, ceased altogether
and silence set in again, more oppressive, more terrible, more
disheartening than ever.
A branch brushed against my face; I recoiled, seized with terror.
Further away, a rise in the ground appeared to me like a man who with
crooked back seemed to be crawling toward me; I loaded my rifle.... At
the sight of an abandoned plough with its arms turned upward toward the
sky, like the menacing horns of some monster, my breath left me and I
almost fell on my back.... I was afraid of the shadow, of the silence,
of the least object that extended beyond the line of the horizon
and which my deranged imagination endowed with a soul of sinister
life.... Despite the cold, perspiration in large drops was streaming
upon my face.... I had a notion to quit my post, to return to camp,
persuading myself by all sorts of ingenious and cowardly arguments that
my comrades had forgotten all about me and that they would be glad to
see me back with them. Obviously, since I had not been relieved by
anyone from my company, and saw none of the officers make his round
of inspection, they must have left.... But supposing I were mistaken
about it, what excuse could I offer, and how would I be received at the
camp?... To go back to the farm where my company was quartered this
morning and ask for instructions?... I was thinking of doing it.... But
in my plight I had lost all sense of direction, and if I attempted to
do that I would surely get lost in this plain that was so endless and
so black.
Then an abominable thought flashed through my mind.... Yes, why not
discharge a bullet into my arm and run back, bleeding and wounded,
and tell them that I had been attacked by the Prussians?... I had
to make a strong effort to regain my reason which was leaving me; I
had to gather all the moral forces that were left in me in order to
get away from this cowardly and odious impulse, from this wretched
ecstasy of fear, and I desperately strove to recall the memories of
former times, to conjure up gentle and silent visions, sweet-scented
and white-winged.... They came to me as in a painful dream, distorted,
mutilated, under the spell of hallucination, and fear immediately
threw them into confusion.... The Virgin of Saint-Michel, with a body
of pink, in a blue mantle, adorned with golden stars, I saw in a lewd
attitude, prostituting herself on a bed, in some miserable shack,
with drunken soldiers. My favorite spots in the Tourouvre forest, so
peaceful, where I used to stay for entire days, stretched out on the
mossy ground, were turning topsy-turvy, tangled up, brandishing their
gigantic trees over me; then a few howitzer shells crossed one another
in the air, resembling familiar faces which sniggered; one of these
projectiles suddenly spread out wide wings, flame-colored, which swung
around me and enveloped me.... I cried out.... My God, am I going
crazy? I felt my breast, my chest, my back, my legs.... I must have
been as pale as a corpse, and I felt a shiver passing through me from
heart to brain, like a steel bore....
"Let's see now," I said aloud to myself to make sure that I was awake,
that I was alive.... In two gulps I swallowed the remainder of the
whiskey in my flask, and I started to walk very fast, tramping with
rage upon the clods under my feet, whistling the air of a soldier song
which we used to sing in chorus to relieve the tedium of the march.
Somewhat calmed, I came back to the oak tree and kicked its trunk with
the sole of my boots; for I was in need of this noise and this physical
motion.... And now I thought of my father so lonely at the Priory. It
was more than three weeks since I had received a letter from him. Oh!
How sad and heart-rending his last letter was!... It did not complain
of anything, but one felt in it a deep despair, a wearisomeness of
being alone in that large empty house, and anxiety about me who, he
knew, was wandering, knapsack on back, amidst the dangers of battle....
Poor father! He had not been happy with my mother--who was ill, always
fretful, who did not love him and could not stand his presence.... And
never a sign of reproach, not even when meeting with the most painful
rebuff and unkindness!... He used to bend his back like a dog, and walk
out....
Ah! how I repented of the fact that I did not love him enough. Perhaps
he had not brought me up in the manner he should have done. But what
difference did it make? He did everything he could!... He was himself
without experience in life, defenseless against evil, of a kindly but
timid nature. And in the measure that the features of my father stood
out clearly before me even to their smallest details, the face of my
mother was obliterating itself, and I was no longer able to recall its
endearing outline. At this moment all the affection that I had for my
mother I transferred to my father. I recalled with tenderness how on
the day my mother died he took me on his lap and said, "Perhaps it's
for the best." And now I understood how much sorrow accumulated in
the past and terror in facing the future there was summed up in that
phrase. It was for her sake that he said that, and also for the sake of
one who resembled my mother so much, and not for his own consolation,
unhappy man that he was, who had resigned himself to suffering all....
During the last three years he had aged very much; his tall frame was
worn out, his face, formerly so red with the color of health, grew
yellow and wrinkled, his hair became almost white. He no longer lay in
wait for the birds in the park, he let the cats rove among the lianas
and lick the water from the basin; he took little interest in his
practice, the direction of which he left to his chief clerk, a trusted
man who was stealing from him; he no longer occupied himself with the
small but honorable affairs of his locality. He never went out, he
would not even stir from his rocking-chair with small pillows which
he ordered moved into the kitchen, not wishing to stay alone--without
Marie who would bring him his cane and his hat.
"Well, Monsieur, you must take a little walk. You are getting all
'rusty' in your corner there...."
"All right, Marie. I am going to take the air.... I'll walk along the
bank of the river, if you want me to."
"No, Monsieur, you must take a walk in the woods.... The air there will
do you good."
"All right, Marie, I am going to take a walk in the woods."
At times, seeing him inactive, slumbering, she would tap him on the
shoulder:
"Why don't you get your rifle, Monsieur? There are a lot of finches in
the park."
And looking at her with an air of reproach, my father would mutter:
"Finches?... The poor things!..."
Why did my father not write to me? Did my letters reach him at all? I
reproached myself with having been too dry in my letters until now, and
I promised myself to write to him the next day--the first opportunity
I got--a long affectionate letter, in which I was going to pour out my
heart to him.
The sky was gradually clearing way yonder on the horizon whose outline
stood out clear against a darker blue. It was still night, the fields
remained dark, but one could feel the approaching dawn. The cold was
more piercing than ever, the earth cracked harder under the feet,
moisture crystallized into drops on the branches of the trees. And
little by little the sky was brightened by a faint glimmer of pale-gold
color which was growing in distinctness. Gradually, outlines emerged
from the shadow, indefinite and confused as yet, the opaque blackness
of the plain changed into a dull violet, here and there rent by
light.... Suddenly I heard a noise, weak at first, like the distant
roll of a drum.... I listened, my heart beating violently. Presently
the noise stopped and the cocks crowed.... About ten minutes later
the noise started again, more distinct, coming nearer!... Pa-ta-ra!
Pa-ta-ra! It was the gallop of a horse on the Chartres road....
Instinctively I buckled up my knapsack on my back and made sure that
my rifle was loaded.... I was very excited, the veins in my temples
dilated.... Pa-ta-ra! Pa-ta-ra!...
Hardly had I time enough to squat down behind the oak tree, when on
the road, at a distance of twenty paces in front of me, there suddenly
appeared a large shadow, surprisingly immobile, like an equestrian
statue of bronze, and this enormous shadow which obtruded itself
almost entirely upon the brightness of the eastern sky was terrible
to behold.... The man appeared to me superhuman, inordinately large
against the sky!...He wore the flat cap of the Prussians, a long
black cloak, under which the chest was bulging out greatly. Was he an
officer or a plain soldier? I did not know, for I could not distinguish
any insignia of rank on the dark uniform.... His features, at first
indistinct, became more accentuated. He had clear eyes, very limpid, a
broad beard, his bearing bespoke youthful strength; his face breathed
power and kindness along with something noble, audacious and sad which
struck me. Holding his hand flat on his thigh, he studied the country
before him, and his horse scraped the ground with its hoofs and puffed
long streams of vapor in the air through its quivering nostrils....
Evidently this Prussian was reconnoitering, he came to observe our
position, the nature of the ground; undoubtedly a whole army was
swarming behind him, waiting for a signal from this man to throw
themselves on the plain!...
Well hidden in my woods, with rifle ready, I was watching him.... He
was handsome indeed, life flowed abundantly in this robust body....
What a pity! He kept on studying the country, and it seemed to me
as though he were studying it more like a poet than a soldier.... I
detected a sort of emotion in his eyes.... Perhaps he forgot why he
had come here and allowed himself to be fascinated by the beauty of
this virginal and triumphant dawn. The sky became all red, it blazed up
gloriously, the awakened fields unrolled themselves in the distance,
emerging one after another from their veil of mist, rose-colored and
blue, which floated like long scarves ruffled by invisible hands. The
trees were dripping dew, the hovels separated themselves from the pink
and blue background, the dove-cot of a large farm whose new tile roofs
began to glitter, projected its whitish cone into the purple glare of
the east.... Yes, this Prussian who started out with the notion to
kill, was arrested, dazzled and reverently stirred by the splendor of a
new-born day, and his soul for a few minutes was the captive of love.
"Perhaps it's a poet," I said to myself, "an artist; he must be kind,
since he is capable of tenderness."
And upon his face I could see all the emotion of a brave man which
agitated him, all the tremors, all the delicate and flitting reactions
of his heart, moved and fascinated.... I feared him no longer. On the
contrary, a sort of infatuation drew me towards him, and I had to
hold on to the tree to keep myself from going to this man. I would
have liked to speak to him, to tell him that it was well that he
contemplated the heaven thus, and that I liked him because of his
receptiveness to beauty.... But his face grew sombre, a sadness stole
into his eyes.... Ah, the horizon over which they swept was so far,
so far away! And beyond that horizon there was another and further
on, still another! One had to conquer all that!... When was he to be
relieved of his duty ever to spur his horse on through this nostalgic
territory, always to cut a way through ruins and through death, always
to kill, always to be cursed!...
And then, undoubtedly, he was thinking of the things he had left
behind; of his home resounding with the laughter of his children, of
his wife, who was waiting for him and praying to God while doing so....
Will he ever see her again?... I was sure that at this very moment
he was recalling the most fugitive details, the most childish habits
of his life at home ... a rose plucked one evening, after dinner,
with which he adorned the hair of his wife, the dress which she wore
when he was leaving, a blue bow on the hat of his little daughter, a
wooden horse, a tree, a river view, a paper knife!... All the memories
of his joys came back to him, and with that keenness of vision which
exiled persons possess, he encompassed in a single mental glance of
despondency all those things by means of which he had been happy until
now....
The sun rose higher, rendering the plain larger, extending the distant
horizon still farther.... I felt a compassion for this man and I loved
him ... yes I swear I loved him!... Well, then, how did that happen?...
A detonation was suddenly heard, and at that very moment I caught sight
of a boot in the air, of a torn piece of a military cloak, of a mane
flying about wildly on the road ... and then nothing, I heard the noise
of a blow with a sabre, the heavy fall of a body, furious beats of a
gallop ... then nothing.... My rifle was warm, and smoke was coming
out of it.... I let it fall to the ground.... Was I the victim of
hallucination?... Clearly not. Of the large shadow which rose skyward
at the middle of the road like an equestrian statue of bronze there was
left but a small corpse all black, stretched out face downward, with
crossed arms.... I recalled the poor cat that my father had killed,
when with fascinated eyes she had been following the flight of a
butterfly....
Stupidly, unconsciously, I had killed a man whom I loved, a man with
whom my soul had just identified itself, a man who in the dazzling
splendor of the rising sun was retracing the purest dreams of his
life!... Perhaps I had killed him at the very moment that that man had
said to himself: "And when I shall see her again at home...." Why? For
what reason? Since I loved him, since, if soldiers had menaced him, I
would have defended him! Why of all men was it he I assassinated? In
two bounds I was beside this man; I called him ... he did not move. My
bullet had pierced his neck under the ear, and blood was gushing from
an opened vein with a gurgling sound, collecting into a red pool and
sticking to his beard.... With trembling hands I raised him slowly, his
head swung from side to side, fell back, inert and heavy.... I felt
his chest where the heart was: it beat no longer.... Then I raised him
again, supporting his head with my knees, and suddenly I saw his eyes,
his two clear eyes which looked at me sadly, without hatred, without
reproach, his two eyes which seemed to be alive!... I thought I was
going to faint, but gathering all my strength in a supreme effort, I
clasped the dead body of the Prussian, placed it right in front of me
and pressing my lips against this bleeding face from which long, purple
threads of congealed slaver were hanging, I desperately kissed it!...
From this moment on I don't remember anything.... I see again smoky
fields covered with snow, and ruins burning incessantly, ever recurring
dismal flights, delirious marches during the night, confusion at the
crossroads congested with ammunition wagons, where the dragoons with
drawn swords were driving their horses right into our midst and trying
to cut a way through the wagons; I see again funeral carriages,
followed by dead bodies of young men which we buried in the frozen
ground, saying to ourselves that tomorrow would be our turn; I see
again, near the cannon carriages, large carcasses of horses dismembered
by howitzer shells, stiff, cut up, over which we used to quarrel
in the evening, from which we used to carry away, into our tents,
bleeding portions which we devoured growling, showing our teeth like
wolves!...And I see again the surgeon, with sleeves of his white coat
rolled up, pipe in mouth, amputating on a table, in a farmhouse, by
the smoky light of a tallow candle, the foot of a little soldier still
wearing his coarse shoes!... But above all I see again the Priory, when
worn out and broken in body and spirit by these sufferings, rendered
apathetic by the disaster of defeat I re-entered it one nice and sunny
day.... The windows of the large house were closed, the window blinds
were down in every room.... Felix, more bent than ever, was cleaning
the walk and Marie, seated near the kitchen door, was knitting a pair
of stockings, wagging her head.
"Well! Well!" I shouted, "is that the way you receive me!"
As soon as the two noticed me, Felix went away as if frightened and
Marie growing pale, uttered a cry.
"What's the matter?" I asked with a heavy heart. "How about father?"
The old woman looked at me fixedly.
"Why, don't you know?... Haven't you received anything?... Ah, my poor
Monsieur Jean! My poor Monsieur Jean!"
And with eyes filled with tears, she stretched out her arms in the
direction of the cemetery.
"Yes! Yes! There is where he is now, with Madame," she said in a dull
voice.